Need your help on deciding between 2 secondhand catamarans that I am looking to buy, mentioned above, which will be used for coastal sailing.

The interior layout was the major reason for me to stop on these two, also to mention that it will be docked in Greece and in terms of transportation it seems that Lagoon will be cheaper, due to higher availability in Europe.

My concern is exterior and interior quality ( I know that Leopard won several awards) but is it reliable in the long run? Maintenance costs? and general feel for the boat and your experience.

I was informed by a few delivery captains that the lagoons after a delivery to the BVI's have alot of creaking and squeekin going on by all the cabinets and structures inside. I think the Leopards are all molded and tight. which Leopards are yu looking at what year, check the designer.

The link is corrupted by the powers that be on CF because of a policy that prevents linking to that site, but PM me and I'll send it to you or search for Leopard 43 on that forum.

I'll paste my review below, but there is an owner who contributes his experiences in the post after mine.

...My impressions of the Leopard 43 are still mostly positive.

I didn't really pay attention to the "squatting" under power last time, but did notice this time--even with both watertanks full. It didn't seem to effect speed too much, but I don't see how it could not have. As fuelconsumption wasn't an issue for us, I didn't really monitor that. I can say, though, if the fuel gauges were accurate the engines are quite economical (though 2600-2800 rpm was the max we usually ran at).

One day, Friday, there were some squalls moving through and Sir Francis Drake Channel had a pretty good chop. I noticed more bridge deck slap than I had remembered from four years ago, and certainly more than on our sail to Anegada or our sail back to Little Jost Van Dyke.

Performance was acceptable--we did hit 8.5 kts at one point on Friday; all the rest of the crew were "single minded" sailors and were impressed by both the room, comfort, and performance of the Leopard 43. We did catch a Lagoon 440 one day much more easily than I thought we should but, in the spirit of full disclosure, they DID have five fenders hanging over the starboard side!

The mainsail is a "bear" to raise; however with two males jumping the main halyard we were able to raise the mainsail to within four feet of the top of the mast; a cinch to winch the rest of the way. If I were just a cruising couple on this boat though, I might want to consider changing the winch.

The masthead rigged genoa is a BIG sail. Consequently it offers a lot of sail to the wind when sailing well off the wind. I found that moving the jib cars forward a bit (depending on the wind angle) and cleating the "lazy" sheet to either of the forward cleats (again, depending on the wind angle) worked quite well given the absence of a pole. An increase in boat speed was definitely noticed and it certainly eliminated a lot of sail flapping.

As before, I noticed the dinghydavits showed some fatigue and this is an area I think anyone considering a Leopard 43 should check.

Checking the oil is a pain. No hot water on the stern step shower! What's that about? I even have one on Searenity!

Too many salon lights means energy consumption when cruising--I would definitely go LED if it was my boat!

No problem with the anchor position when anchoring, though I am aware of complaints. I don't know if this is actually a problem or just "purists" who prefer the anchor on a roller going over the crossbar. Searenity's anchor does and I do prefer that setup, but had no problem with the Leopard setup. I think it may actually facilitate letting out the chain quicker as you back down from the anchor drop point!

As I said, this was probably one of the last trips for "Retirement Fun" in the Moorings fleet--it was probably one of the oldest cats, but was still in good shape.

Moorings appears to be giving preference to the power cats, as they are all docked closest to the Drake Channel and the Moorings Office. I was surprised as to how many there were compared to four years ago.

The Leopard 44 is extremely noticeable in both the Moorings and Sunsail fleets (same base) and it makes a lot of sense to cruise the BVI's in that boat. You sit at anchor/mooring in the forward cockpit with your rum drink with the breeze blowing in your face is just paradise! We were impressed by that boat at the NewportBoat Show in September and would have liked to be on one of those but none available...

I hope this helps. Good luck in you search.

Marshall

__________________"People sail for fun and no one has yet convinced me that it's more fun to go slow than it is to go fast." -Dick Newick

The Leopard 43 and Lagoon 420 to me seem like two very different boats. While both produced mainly for charter, the Leopard is geared more for performance. The Leopard 43 I sailed hit 8.5 to 9 knots pretty easy and did reasonably well in light air. I have not sailed the Lagoon 420, but none of the other Lagoons I sailed performed this well.

There were many features that I liked about the Leopard 43 but will point out a couple negatives. As previously mentioned, the main winch is on the mast making single handed sailing difficult. Also, somewhat hard to raise. Forward berths were high off the floor which I don't care for. The saloon floor had a different elevation under the table which resulted in one twisted ankle in the group. Finally the non skid surface on the decks was way on the rough side. Nice for safety but left an imprint in your butt. Several guest complained about this issue. I guess buy more cushions.

Been on a Lagoon 420 a couple times but didn't sail them. A brilliant layout for charter with four heads with separate showers. Owners say the boats were stable cruisers. Not real fast but respectable speeds. Not the best light air boats. Fair to say they hold lots of stuff. Go for the newer boat with diesels not electric.

Overall I liked the Leopard 43. The admiral likes the layout of the Lagoon 420.

Thank you very much for your feedback, Im going to be in Cape Town during the weekend will make sure to stop check out the Leopard's, getting a lot of good feedback on the interior design and also im tall and lagoon might be a problem.

I have delivered a number of the 43's all over the world, all from Cape Town. Whilst hiding from hurricane Wilma in 2005, I had TS Alpha come right over me whilst anchored off a small island in the Turk & Caicos group. Only damage was the wind instrument on the masthead flew off after reaching 80 knots. They were built strong and sailed exceptionally well. Took one to Tahiti, two to Fort Lauderdale, a couple to Tortola and a couple to charter bases in the Med. Nice comfortable boats which are easy to sail short-handed. Nice thing also is that they have shafts and not saildrives like the newer Leopards.

I have only once, in over 400,000nmI, sailed a Lagoon 420 and cannot really pass comment on it other than to say I found it quite unresponsive to the helm and was generally not too impressed.

If you are in Cape Town this weekend, hope you do not cook too much with the heat we are having at the moment. If you want to chat about the 43, send me a PM and I will send you my mobile number - I am in Cape Town. John.

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The Delivery Guy
Now retired after sailing over 400,000nm